The ashes are then scattered over the fields to fertilise them and the remainder of the body is eaten." In other cases quoted by the same author an image only was made of flour and eaten instead of a human being: [214] "In Mexico at a certain period of the year the priest of Quetzalcoatl made an image of the Deity, of meal mixed with infants' blood, and then, after many impressive ceremonies, killed the image by shooting it with an arrow, and tore out the heart, which was eaten by the king, while the rest of the body was distributed among the people, every one of whom was anxious to procure a piece to eat, however small." Here the communal sacrificial meal, the remaining link necessary to connect the sacrifice of the corn-spirit with that of the domestic animal and clan totem, is present.

Among cases of animals sacrificed as the corn-spirit in India that of the buffalo at the Dasahra festival is the most important.

The rite extends over most of India, and a full and interesting account of it has recently been published by Mr.W.Crooke.

[215] The buffalo is probably considered as the corn-spirit because it was the animal which mainly damaged the crops in past times.

Where the sacrifice still survives the proprietor of the village usually makes the first cut in the buffalo and it is then killed and eaten by the inferior castes, as Hindus cannot now touch the flesh.